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Chandra conditionally agrees to lie-detector test

Zee Group chairman Subhash Chandra on Wednesday told a court here that he was willing to undergo a lie-detector test, subject to informing his doctors first and getting an approval from them, while the two arrested editors of Zee Group news channels refused the police plea.

The police are probing allegations that Rs. 100 crore was demanded from Jindal Steel and Power Ltd. (JSPL) in the form of advertisements to purportedly dilute the campaign launched by Zee News and Zee Business against JSPL in connection with the coal block allocation scam.

Vijay Aggarwal, Mr. Chandra’s counsel, told the court that the police would have to inform him about the procedure used in a lie-detector test and then his client would need to take advice from doctors who are treating him. The two editors, Sudhir Chaudhary and Samir Ahluwalia, however, agreed to the police plea seeking their voice samples. Rejecting the police plea for the lie detector tests, the two editors said they feared that the investigation was being influenced by Navin Jindal and that they were being falsely implicated in the case.

Metropolitan Magistrate Gaurav Rao sought Mr. Chandra’s presence in person in court on December 13 and also issued production warrants to Tihar Jail authorities for the appearance of the two editors, before he disposes of the Delhi Police plea. The police had said despite confronting with Mr. Chandra with the two editors, the prosecution needed the lie-detection tests to bring the “truth” of the matter on record.

Mr. Aggarwal also asked why the police had not moved any application for subjecting JSPL officials to a lie-detection test.